Tegu questions

[MadameButterfly]

Make sure you add calcium supplement without vitamins to every meal without bones.

I added it to the egg and covered the crickets with it too, thay were practically white I put that much on them

 

[dragonmetalhead]

Tegus love to burrow and if they're hunkered down and comfy, they won't budge. I wouldn't worry too much, just make sure to add fresh water if he comes up for a drink.

 

[MadameButterfly]

Tegus love to burrow and if they're hunkered down and comfy, they won't budge. I wouldn't worry too much, just make sure to add fresh water if he comes up for a drink.

I'm more worried about her getting enough food and UV light, is she OK going a day or two without them if thats what she chooses?

 

[james.w]

Yes she will be fine.

 

[MadameButterfly]

Cheers James, about bedding, at the moment I am only using those dark brown wood chips (I think they are called "Mulch"? ) but they are very dry and I know she needs humidity so is there anything else I can mix and use as bedding also to incrase the moisture and humidity for her? would peat moss work too if mixed with the Mulch?

Peat Moss

It is available in Ireland for about €4 (about $7) for a really large bag

Sorry for all the questions but I really want her to be comfortable and happy so the more I learn the better

 

[james.w]

Yes the moss will help. You could also add a few more inches of the substrate you are currently using and if the enclosure is watertight you can just dump water into the substrate and stir it around. What do you have as fas as ventilation goes?

 

[MadameButterfly]

Yes it is water tight to about half a foot deep (the base and sides are all sealed) as for ventilation the top is a solid peice of perspex but there are over 300 1 centimeter holes drilled in it and also there are 1 centimeter slots drilled down the front from the top to about 2 thirds of the way down and about a 1 centimeter gap between the door and the parts it locks to, ventilation isn't a problem

 

[james.w]

Ventilation sounds like it is a problem, there is too much of it. Try adding more substrate and covering some of those holes.

 

[MadameButterfly]

I was actually worried that there wasn't enough ventilation for her, should I try covering about 100 of the holes up?

 

[james.w]

I have a 8'*3.5'*3' cage and it has no ventilation other than the small gap around the doors. The daily opening and closing of the doors allows for enough air exchange.

 

[dragonmetalhead]

I have never heard of a reptile suffocating in its tank from lack of air, if that's what you're worried about.

 

[MadameButterfly]

I have never heard of a reptile suffocating in its tank from lack of air, if that's what you're worried about.

I know I sound really paranoid but I'll try explain why, see when I got my first snake 2 yeas ago

After 3 days she disappeared from her tank and I never found her again, the tank seemed fine so I had no idea where she went or how she escaped so I bought another one (a lavender cornsnake) and that disappeared too so I then checked the tank the petshop gave me again and realised that it was a tank for bigger animals not baby snakes and the gap in the latches on the lid were obviously big enough for the snakes to crawl through at night (this is the latches)

It was their mistake not mine, I got a new snake and the correct tank but since then I am obsessive about checking on her. I know that Kiff can't get out of her tank either and that burrowing is natural for her but that experience with my first two snakes has just put that worry in the back of my mind and it is always there if she doesn't show her face for a long time. I just worry if she is OK.

 

[dragonmetalhead]

I can get paranoid about my pets as well, so please don't be concerned. I'm sorry about your snakes. It sounds to me like Kiff has a very devoted tegu-parent so I am sure your lizard will be just fine. I have to ask, though, is Kiff named after the character form Futurama>

 

[MadameButterfly]

I can get paranoid about my pets as well, so please don't be concerned. I'm sorry about your snakes. It sounds to me like Kiff has a very devoted tegu-parent so I am sure your lizard will be just fine. I have to ask, though, is Kiff named after the character form Futurama>

lol yeah, I love Zapp Brannigan and Kiff, Zaph's one liners are just awesome and Kiff is just the most hard done by guy ever I really think they should have made a spin off with just those two and made it a total parody of the original Star Trek, who ever wrote their characters was hilarious

Leela: You know, Zapp, someone ought to teach you a lesson.
Zapp: If it's a lesson in love, watch out. I suffer from a very sexy learning disability. What did I call it, Kiff?
Kiff: Ugh... sexlexia.

Zapp: there isn't an Alien in this universe I can't kill and if there is I haven't killed him yet.

And my personal favorite

Zapp: She looks like a steakhouse but handles like a bistro.

Best character ever on that show

 

[dragonmetalhead]

That's awesome! Futurama kicks ass. Zoidberg is my favorite and I actually met Billy West my freshman year of college. Some of my favorite Zapp lines:
Brannigan's law is like Brannigan's love, hard and fast!
The mind is willing but the body is spongey and weak.
A littler lower, Kiff. Lower. Lower. Too low. . . . Lower.
Would you care for some champagne? (pronounced sham-pag-in)

 

[Khoilie]

you were sayin you were worried when your tegu ate eggs then slept for a really long time, its normal. mine does the exact same thing. when i run out of ground turkey, ill boil up a few eggs for him and when hes done eating, he'll sleep for like 2 days, wake up, take a huge ****, then bask all day, then pass out in his water lol. its kinda funny come to think of it. i just think that eggs are really filling for tegus or somethin

 

[MadameButterfly]

That's awesome! Futurama kicks A**. Zoidberg is my favorite and I actually met Billy West my freshman year of college. Some of my favorite Zapp lines:
Brannigan's law is like Brannigan's love, hard and fast!
The mind is willing but the body is spongey and weak.
littler lower, Kiff. Lower. Lower. Too low. . . . Lower.
Would you care for some champagne? (pronounced sham-pag-in)

Yeah he has the best oneliners ever, I love the eposide where him and Kiff go on a date with with Amy and Lela and he gets up to do karaoki and says "Let me show you why they call me the Velour Fog and then starts singing LELA, LE LE LE LELE LEEEEELAAAAAA", thats the one with "The mind is willing but the body is spongey and weak." in it. I think that was my favorite episode out of them all

---

you were sayin you were worried when your tegu ate eggs then slept for a really long time, its normal. mine does the exact same thing. when i run out of ground turkey, ill boil up a few eggs for him and when hes done eating, he'll sleep for like 2 days, wake up, take a huge Poo, then bask all day, then pass out in his water lol. its kinda funny come to think of it. i just think that eggs are really filling for tegus or somethin

Thanks for that because guess what, I fed her eggs again last night and she hasn't shown her face at all today so that must be the reason, thanks for putting my mind at ease, I'll have to keep that in mind from now on for when I give her eggs, god it's like rasing a child at times isn't it? There is so much to learn

 

[Khoilie]

no problem, i dont have children so i have no idea what thats like but to get everything proper and make your tegu happy it does a little bit of elbow grease, some time, patients, and a lot of research... well for me anyways lol. I've spent so much time reading, asking questions and talking to different people I probably could of learned another language haha. But at the end of the day I'm happy now. I went from knowing next to nothing about these reptiles and having one that I thought hated me, to being a tegu information machine lol and having a healthy, happy tegu that i love. I've been reading and watching videos about training them so i think my next venture will be to train my tegu to attack a ball on a stick for food, then when i find a female I'll try my hand at breeding

 

[MadameButterfly]

no problem, i dont have children so i have no idea what thats like but to get everything proper and make your tegu happy it does a little bit of elbow grease, some time, patients, and a lot of research... well for me anyways lol. I've spent so much time reading, asking questions and talking to different people I probably could of learned another language haha. But at the end of the day I'm happy now. I went from knowing next to nothing about these reptiles and having one that I thought hated me, to being a tegu information machine lol and having a healthy, happy tegu that i love. I've been reading and watching videos about training them so i think my next venture will be to train my tegu to attack a ball on a stick for food, then when i find a female I'll try my hand at breeding

Actually I am having a problem right now that I hope some of you can help me with, her normal routein is I feed her (using a pink glove so that she doesn't associate my hand with food) and take her out (wearing a white glove because she still snaps a lot) and bring her into my bathroom and sit there for an hour with her and let her walk around and until today it was working, she seemed calm but today I tried take her out for her bathroom time and she went nuts, she bit me and then ran up my arm and jumped from my shoulder to a chair about 3 feet away all in the space of about 5 seconds and then stood on the chair hissing at me. I had to let her bite me again to distract her so that I could catch her before she did a runner. Now nothing changed, her food and light routein is still the same, I didn't dig her up from her burrow or anything, she just seems to be overly agressive all of a sudden.

What I am doing to get her to trust me obviously isn't working so has anyone any tips on how I can get her to calm down and trust me more? because I love her to bits but I can't keep her if she stays like this because at some point she will have jaws strong enough to bite my finger off if this agression keeps up

 

[james.w]

Some days they just don't want to be bothered with. Try to read her and see what she wants.